Bridesmaids: Rated R as some material may be inappropriate for those 40 and above if they’re sitting next to their teenage daughters

I took Zoe to see an R-rated movie for the first time last Friday night because (1) she was the legal age, having turned seventeen over a month ago; and (2) she actually asked to see it with me instead of with her friends and it was either take her to see the movie or just die happy right then and there. I had plans on Saturday that couldn’t be canceled so dying on the spot would have been inconvenient.

I know for most parents, taking their seventeen year old to an R-rated movie is no big deal and some of you are probably sitting there complaining, Oh my God, next thing you know she’ll be telling us she let Zoe shave her armpits by herself.

I LET ZOE SHAVE HER ARMPITS BY HERSELF.

There! Didn’t want you to be disappointed.

The movie was sort of a big thing for me because I have always been *that* mom, the one who stuck like gorilla glue to rules such as not letting her sit in the front seat until she was twelve, not letting her get a Facebook account until she was fifteen, not letting her date or get a “real” cell phone with unlimited texting until she was sixteen and not letting her see an R-rated movie until she was seventeen. I’m sure there were a few million other things I didn’t let her do that I can’t remember off the top of my head but if you need to know, just ask Zoe and I’m sure she’ll be more than happy to whip out her handy dandy WHY MY LIFE SUCKED spreadsheet and rattle them off for you.

Zoe had already seen a couple of R-rated movies with her dad, even before she turned seventeen. Why? Because, her dad is *that* dad, the one who doesn’t have any hard and fast rules. He also doesn’t make her do laundry or dishes or clean the bathroom. He’s the fun parent, a slightly balding Disney World in Fruit of the Looms, if you will.

He assured me beforehand that the movies were rated R based on violence only, as opposed to sexual content and all I could say was WHEW. Everybody knows it’s totally OK to let kids witness the depravity of people getting their heads blown off but it’s totally *not* OK to let them witness the depravity of people getting their rocks off. Because watching the former might only sway kids into becoming sociopathic, mass murderers. Big whoop. But watching the latter? That might make them want to have sex WHICH IS SO MUCH WORSE, I CAN’T EVEN BEGIN TO FATHOM IT.

That crooked line you see there? Those are my priorities, zigzagging their way straight to Hell.

Anyway, I took Zoe to see Bridesmaids last Friday.

About 2.7 seconds into the opening scene, I found myself wishing I had started with an easier R-rated movie, like Boogie Nights.

Had I been with my girlfriends, the opening scene would have lasted a minute, two tops. With Zoe, it lasted about three years. Because watching a scene in which “friends with benefits” literally pump their way through a montage of missionary to doggy to WAIT, WHAT? IS THAT …? WHERE’S HER LEG? I’M SORRY, BUT THAT CANNOT POSSIBLY BE COMFORTABLE sex positions at bionic speed is one thing with your girlfriends but with your teenage daughter? It’s quite another and I’d be lying if I said I didn’t at least entertain the thought of yanking Zoe out of there on the spot, flinging her into the theater next door and forcing her to watch Kung Fu Panda 2 instead. But I had promised Zoe before even sitting down that there would be no heavy sighs from me, no sideways glances of disapproval, no loud pleas for the floor to open up and swallow us whole and most of all, no yelling of ALL YOU PEOPLE REALIZE THAT THIS IS NOTHING AT ALL LIKE REAL LIFE, RIGHT? SEX IS ABSOLUTELY NO FUN AT ALL. AND IT GIVES YOU ZITS to the theater at large.

So I just cringed and whimpered and secretly pondered the benefits of lubricant through that whole scene, and then I tried to pretend that the whole conversation that occurred in the next scene between Annie and Lillian just didn’t, and then I pretty much spent the next ninety minutes alternating between laughing, gouging my eyes out, giggling hysterically, and puncturing my ear drums with a Twizzler and then it was over.

When the night was over, despite my worries that she saw more sex in an hour and half than I’ve seen this whole year, Zoe was still Zoe. And I was still me! Not sure if that’s a good thing but it is what it is.

Next week I think I might take Helena to see Judy Moody and the Not Bummer Summer. It’s rated PG and I’m fairly certain it will not contain any scenes in which characters discuss the best way to discreetly slap a guy’s junk away from your face.

Which means I can leave the eye and ear bleach at home and that definitely is a good thing because my purse is only big enough to smuggle in M&Ms.

Wow, good for you for relaxing your rules a bit. My kids have watched plenty or R rated movies but here’s how it happens. I get them on DVD and fast forward through the sex scenes, while blocking the TV with my body, if possible. My kids think sex happens at warp speed. If there is really inappropriate behavior on the screen, I stop the movie and they get a lecture about it. Finally, I order ALL the movies around here. They have zero access to the Netflix account, although I will let them request movies and sometimes I order them if it’s something I want to see.Dee recently posted..What Ive Learned

I have to crack up because I went to see this movie last weekend – by myself. Approximately 3.2 seconds into it, I was SO GLAD I didn’t take my 17 year old to see it with me!! She’d be fine seeing it, just not with me. On the plus side, absolutely hysterical movie!! Judd Apatow should do more chick flicks. 🙂

Oh my heaven… you are so funny. My kiddo is only 5 so I don’t really have to worry about this (yet). It sounds like you did a great job getting through this, and obviously your humor is still intact!Jackie @ It’s a Wahm Life recently posted..You Do It Your Way I’ll Do It Mine

I can’t wait to see this movie. And I’m so glad that I don’t have a teenage daughter who would want me to take her! Though I do have a 17 year old neice. And I don’t care if she begs me. No WAY am I going to sit there through that first scene with her! Let HER mom take her!!!!! 😉

I am also now glad I have a boy who will probably only want to see action/horror films. And his dad can take him to those. . .

I can’t watch edited for tv movies with sex scenes in them with my parents. I’m 43 & they are in their 70s. I suspect that due to the 2 grandchildren I’ve given them they realize I know how sex works. But I will under no circumstances confirm that for them by mentioning sex to them.

I can’t imagine the boys asking me to go to a movie with them when they are 17 so I’m safe.stacey@Havoc&Mayhem recently posted..may reading

Dude, I totally would’ve warned you against this one. Actually, my husband did warn someone against taking her FIFTEEN YEAR OLD to see it when she solicited opinions on FB about it. We saw it (just us, not our eight year old LOL) and thought it was funny but man, even being there with the Man I Have Done *Those* Things With for Almost Half My Life, there were some “holy crap” moments like that opening scene. It was laughing hysterically through a mild cringe (because damn, some of those positions did NOT look comfortable), if you KWIM.

My worst moment like yours came when I chose the movie Malice from the video store once to watch with my parents and grandmother. Husband and I had seen it in the theater and when I was tasked with going to pick out something for us all to watch, I just remembered “hey, this was pretty good” and not the crazy, graphic, nude sex scene (featuring Nicole Kidman, I do believe) that occurs fairly early on in the film. My father’s eyebrows went so high up his forehead it looked like he’d joined the Hair Club for Men, because they were pretty much bangs, and my mother’s jaw did one of those cartoon animal things where it unhinged and hit the floor while her eyes bugged out of her skull. My (then mid-80s-year old) grandmother just chuckled. Heh. I wanted to DIE.Heather @ nobody-but-yourself recently posted..Rapture- shmapture

LOL….so funny! I remember as a teen starting to watch The Graduate with my conservative Dad. He looked at me and said, well I think you’re old enough to watch this, don’t you? I kind of choked out, um yeah. Then squirmed on the couch for the rest of the movie. Still makes me feel weirded out after all this time….

OMG I LOVED that movie but as we were one of the first ones in the theater I pondered some of the people who came in after and wondered how uncomfortable they would be during some of the scenes. I was with my bff though so I was all good.Lisa recently posted..Wordless Wednesday- 6-1-11

I do not think I will ever be able to take my Ro, at the age of 17, to see an R rated movie. It would quite literally kill me. And since I will be *cough* FIFTY-ONE *cough* when she turns seventeen, it’s not beyond the realm of possibility.

By the way, Boogie Nights was rated NC-17, not R. It barely squeaked by the X rating. But it was a damn good movie. Marky-Mark’s got a huge…talent, so to speak. 😀Shan @ Last Shreds Of Sanity recently posted..I’m Trying It Again- NaBloPoMo- June 2011 – Fan

My parents were the ones that let me watch the “action/violence” stuff at a young age, but not the sex stuff. I wonder now at the fact that I saw Jurassic Park, various James Bond movies, and the original Alien all before I was in 6th grade.

I just can’t imagine having to watch something like that with my teenager who is now turning 16. Sometimes I fear that he will be sexually predisposed having to watch these kinda movies in HBO and DVD’s. He watches alone at times, and he locks the door and I just cannot figure out why.
I feel so awkward sometimes when there’s a love scene, bed scene,,or whatever..in the movies,,,and I see him look away, maybe feeling the same way.elley recently posted..Diabetes Mellitus- What is it

Ha ha, something about Mary was and still is funny watching if any of my kids are in the room! They are 25, 23 and 20. To many movies with uncomfortable situations to name!
Stopping by from Momdot.com for my first Alexa hop here!April Decheine recently posted..Buy Alphabet Photos Review

You are a braver woman than I! Can you imagine what it was like when that first scene was what we got instead of Pirates On Stranger Tides? Oh… WHILE SITTING THERE WITH our 11yr old son and a theater full of parents and their young children ALL expecting Pirates? Not cool. I wrote about it as well…http://inthecaptainsquarters.blogspot.com/

My husband still has not got over watching Basic Instinct with his mom (they rented the DVD). LOL! I don’t usually let my 14 year old see “R” movies until it’s a horror movie and it’s not THAT bad.Kimberly recently posted..Teens & Cell Phone “Sexting”

How have I never seen this post before? I am a bad mommy and took my 13 year old daughter to see Bridesmaids. I covered her eyes during the sex parts. LOLRebel Chick Jenn recently posted..Checking in from Barbados…

Wait…you ACTUALLY made your poor, poor kid wait till they were 17 to see R rated films? You realize she’s probably seen a ton of them at her friends’ houses anyway, right? Honestly that rule sounds really unusual. I mean, I’ve been watching them since I was 9 and all my friends were watching them by the time we were in middle school. The stuff you don’t know just goes over your head, and what are you protecting her from anyway? I mean, the more you know…

Though it’s nice to know that when awkward movie sex scenes come up, it’s not just the young folk who feel awkward : ) Watching the Sex and the City hand-job class scene where Miranda gets cum on her forehead with my Mom was pretty unbearable…haha

I am 19 and don’t find it awkward watching sex scenes with my parents. I watched moderately sexual movies from a young age. but my mum was careful of things that portrayed women as just sexual objects. Violence I saw less of but still more than most parents on here would allow I think. But all my friends had seen the same movies so I’ve never considered this unusual. Jurassic Park in sixth grade? I think I saw that in 2nd grade although I would usually fall asleep before the end.
As long as the movie was moral overall, I watched it. And I think I am a better thinker because of it.

Mom to Zoe and Helena and warm lap to Oliver. I'm short and uptight with freakishly pointy elbows. My thumbs lose all mobility when I laugh and I could live on cheese. If you're insanely bored, click WHO AM I to read more.